Heinrich Nauen
Studie zu der reitenden Amazone nach rechts II
1913
Watercolour and white body colour on brownish paper. 37.2 x 47 cm. Framed under glass. Signed and dated 'H. Nauen 0.13' in pencil lower right. - Minimally browned, isolated marginal defects.
In 1912, Heinrich Nauen was commissioned by his patron Edwin Suermondt to paint a monumental mural in Drove Castle in the district of Düren, which was owned by the Suermondt family. This so-called Drove cycle of six tempera paintings is the main work in Nauen's oeuvre and is now in the Kaiser Wilhelm Museum in Krefeld. With a focus on colour and pictorial rhythm, Nauen combined thematically disparate motifs, including a battle of Amazons, a garden painting and a Pietà. He designed the extensive pictorial programme in numerous preliminary studies, including this study for a figure of the Battle of the Amazons.
Catalogue Raisonné
Drenker-Nagels 115
Provenance
Dr Walter Kaesbach Foundation (stencil stamp on the accompanying former frame backing); Städtisches Museum Mönchengladbach; Private ownership, Hesse; Math. Lempertz'sche Kunstversteigerung, Cologne, Auction 550, Art of the XXth Century, May 1976, Lot 439; Private Collection, North Rhine-Westphalia
Literature
Städtisches Museum Mönchengladbach. Oskar-Kühlen-Stiftung, Bestandskatalog II. Heinrich Nauen. Mit einem Beitrag über Dr. Walter Kaesbach und seine Stiftung, Mönchengladbach 1958, no. K 40; Franz Roh, Entartete Kunst. Kunstbarbarei im Dritten Reich, Hanover 1962, p. 228
Exhibitions
Mönchengladbach 1922 (Städtisches Museum), Rohlfs, Nauen, Feininger, Heckel, Nolde. Bilder, Aquarelle und Zeichnungen, cat. no. 56; Mönchengladbach 1928 (Karl-Brandts-Haus), Campendonk, Feininger, Heckel, Kirchner, Lehmbruck, Macke, Mueller, Nauen, Nolde, Pechstein, Rohlfs, Schmidt-Rottluff. Bilder, Aquarelle, Zeichnungen, Dr Walter Kaesbach Foundation, p. 20